John from X Fusion Shox is coming to Albuquerque this weekend, with a van full of demo bikes kitted out with their forks and shocks.
We talked about doing a demo day, but that sounded too much like work, and involved not riding bikes.
Instead, we are doing a group demo ride.

We will be heading out from Otero Canyon trailhead Sunday, May 27th, 10:30 am for an open invite group ride. Feel free to show up and get set up on one of the demo bikes, and try out some of the sweet suspension that X Fusion is making these days. We are going to try and start riding around 10:30, but if you are interested in getting on a demo bike, show up early (9:30 or later) to give us time to get everything dialed in.

We will probably ride for 3 or 4 hours, bouncing all around in Otero, riding the typical loops.

Some of the demo bikes available will include Turner 5 Spots, Santa Cruz Tallboys, Tomac Diplomats, Ibis Mojo HD's, and Specialized Enduros.

After we finish our ride we will be hanging out at the trailhead with a tent, beverages, snacks, and we will continue to send people out on demo bikes for the day.

Give us a heads up if you are definitely planning on attending, so we can start to get a head count.

So you don't know about X Fusion suspension yet? They are currently making what is, in my opinion, some of the best suspension available today. Such at their trail fork, the 140mm Velvet, which I am currently riding personally. It retails for about half the price of a similar Fox, and I think it's the best riding fork I've ever owned. Check out the website...

Last weekend was the second running of the 12 Hours in the Wild West race, outside of Ruidoso NM.

We attended last year, enjoyed ourselves thoroughly, and decided to go again this year. It also seemed a good opportunity to close up shop a little bit and remind ourselves what a 3 day weekend was like (spoiler alert, 3 day weekends are good).

It began to rain and even hail angrily right as we were trying to leave the shop, load bikes onto racks, close up the trailer, etc. The hail was an ominous start to the weekend, which had not been blessed with the most appealing of forecasts. All week long the weather report had shown angry little rain clouds and even lightning bolts in Ruidoso. And the weekend promised even more rain clouds and lightning bolts, according to the Weather Channel. So as we drove down a flooded Lomas Ave. amid a freakish heavy rain and hail storm, we were all anxious what the weekend held in store.

On the drive down, somebody in Charlie's car made the executive decision that we should pre-race dinner at Taco Bell. Having been looking for an excuse to try out the new freakshow excuse of food I had seen on commercials, which consists of a taco made in a nacho cheese Doritos flavored shell, I happily followed my cohorts into "the Bell". All I can say about the freakshow Doritos taco is that clearly "the Bell" has employed highschool boys who are fond of marijuana to create their new menu items, and if this taco existed when I was a highschool boy I would have eaten a whole lot of them.

We arrived at dusk to the race venue with angry tummies, to find muddy ground and rainy skies. We quickly set up the trailer, awning, and a few tents. But as my boys were soaking and covered in mud after just a few minutes, the wife and I decided to head into town and skip the soggy camping for the night. We headed into Ruidoso and crashed with Paul (aka Taco Truck). His family has a time warp cabin in Ruidoso, where you can find gems such as the worlds first microwave..

Awoke Saturday morning to an overcast sky, and a little hung over (when the Taco Truck sticks a bottle of tequila in your hand, it's hard to say no). But as we approached the race course, the sun came out, and miraculously stayed out for nearly the entire day. The race was delayed an hour to let the course dry up a bit. The course was also detoured around the techy climbing section, which was reportedly very muddy. Instead we got a long boring and demoralizing gravel climb. The sunny skies had everybody in good spirits.

The first lap of the race was just slightly muddy, but by the second lap the ground was getting more firm, and quickly turned to the super tacky superhero traction type of dirt that you rarely get to play on in New Mexico.

Combining the awesome traction with the super smooth and narrow singletrack on the race course made for some serious grin inducing big ring descents.

My parents came out to spectate and help wrangle my kiddos so that I could get some more laps in. Here's a pic of Big Rick and Papa Lucero chatting. You can see Rick's highly refined solo 12 hour race diet of cold Chef Boyardee straight from the can, and orange gatorade. My parents came out to spectate and help wrangle my kiddos so that I could get some more laps in. Here's a pic of Big Rick and Papa Lucero chatting. You can see Rick enjoying his highly refined solo 12 hour race diet of cold Chef Boyardee straight from the can, and orange gatorade.

I took a long break from racing in the middle of the day to get my boys signed up for the kids race, which was awesome...

The Bikeworks contingent at the race was substantial, but in the end only Mike and Maggie got on the podium, placing second in the co-ed Duo category.

As the day drew to a close, everyone agreed that it was a successful venture. A big thanks to the Zia Rides crew for putting together another awesome event. It has really wet our appetite to get out and play again for the 24 Hours in the Enchanted Forest.

We will be closing at 4pm on Friday May 11th, and Closed all day Saturday May 12th.

We will re-open for normal hours at 10am on Tuesday May 15th.

We are closing so that we can go race the 12 Hours in the Wild West race near Ruidoso NM.
Can't live without seeing us for the weekend? Well then you just have to come to the race and find us. You could even race, registration doesn't close until May 7th.